DATELINE: 26.02.09 ROME, ITALY
Early this morning I arrived in Rome to spend 10 days soaking up some sun and visiting my brother. I admit, it feels very cool to say 'oh just popping off to Rome for a spell to visit my brother.' =) hot.
Thinking it would be a good way to maximize my visit, and given the option of two tickets costing the same, I chose the flight that left Paris at 7am and arrived in Rome at 9am. I stand by my original thinking that this was a good idea, but man I am hella-tired. I'm so far beyond tired that I actually feel hyper.
In order to get to the airport in time for check-in and to make it through security and to my gate on time, I had to be en route by 5am, to arrive at Aeroport d'Orly by 6am. In order for this all to actually be successful, I left my apartment at 4:45am. Which meant I had to wake up by 3:45am so that there was time eat, get my head on straight, and to make sure everything was in order, that I was not forgetting anything, that all the burners and lights were off, etc.
It is now noon and I have been awake since 3:40am this morning. My brain somehow manages to continue functioning, but my body is asleep. I was so anxious about getting up on time and getting to the airport, etc, that I hardly slept at all last night. To boot, I made potatoes for dinner last night and thus everything in my apartment smelled liked potatoes all night long, making me both unable to sleep and hungry - at some point I did manage to catch a little sleep, to the lullaby of my grumbling stomach. Today, still for the entire flight all I smelled was potatoes. Damed potatoes.
And now, with the phantom smell of potatoes still clogging my nose, I am off to take a nap of sorts on the sun drenched terrace. brilliant. Terraces should be required on all apartments everywhere.
Thursday, February 26, 2009
Friday, February 20, 2009
a kilo of dates
DATELINE: 20.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
Newsflash! Small pasty-white girl braves Barbes market, spends €13 and comes home with more than she can carry. Kicks self in arse upon return home when reminded that it all has to be hauled up 6 flights of stairs. Feels guilty that she can only name the origin of the oranges she purchased, has no idea where the rest of it came from.
Is said to be doling out dates (the dried fruit variety) to anyone who will accept them after having realized that a kilo of dates is A LOT of dates (but for €2, who could resist!).
----
The Barbes market, which is the outdoor market not far from where I now live, is the Haymarket of Paris's outdoor markets. Things are super cheap, but it's SUPER crowded, muddy, and the food doesn't look quite as good. So, I am unlikely to make Barbes my regular market. The markets in general are cheaper than the grocery stores, and the other ones seem to have more of the good food, local food.
I'm off to Rome in a few days for spring break. I'm really excited. WOOOO spring break! I should have planned ahead more though, because this is not a cheap ticket. But it's less than it would cost me from the states, so whatever. There is going to be a festival, and some playing at "the country house", and maybe a day trip to where they filmed Passion of the Christ (could care less about the movie, but the place it was filmed is supposedly really cool). On my to-do list: bring home a bottle of Limoncello. Maybe two. =)
Alright, time to head back to my tiny little pad and get some lunch.
Photos to come soon, I promise!
A la prochaine fois!
Newsflash! Small pasty-white girl braves Barbes market, spends €13 and comes home with more than she can carry. Kicks self in arse upon return home when reminded that it all has to be hauled up 6 flights of stairs. Feels guilty that she can only name the origin of the oranges she purchased, has no idea where the rest of it came from.
Is said to be doling out dates (the dried fruit variety) to anyone who will accept them after having realized that a kilo of dates is A LOT of dates (but for €2, who could resist!).
----
The Barbes market, which is the outdoor market not far from where I now live, is the Haymarket of Paris's outdoor markets. Things are super cheap, but it's SUPER crowded, muddy, and the food doesn't look quite as good. So, I am unlikely to make Barbes my regular market. The markets in general are cheaper than the grocery stores, and the other ones seem to have more of the good food, local food.
I'm off to Rome in a few days for spring break. I'm really excited. WOOOO spring break! I should have planned ahead more though, because this is not a cheap ticket. But it's less than it would cost me from the states, so whatever. There is going to be a festival, and some playing at "the country house", and maybe a day trip to where they filmed Passion of the Christ (could care less about the movie, but the place it was filmed is supposedly really cool). On my to-do list: bring home a bottle of Limoncello. Maybe two. =)
Alright, time to head back to my tiny little pad and get some lunch.
Photos to come soon, I promise!
A la prochaine fois!
Monday, February 16, 2009
Home, Sweet home.
DATELINE: 16.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
All moved into the new pad and so happy. It of course has it's short comings but they are all part of the character. =) I'll post the pictures soon. I took some this morning but forgot to load them onto my computer before leaving the house. I don't have internet at home yet - so these may be a little slow in coming.
I will note, though, that as my studio faces the courtyard in the center of the building I am oblivious to what happens over night on the street. This morning I left the apt to find that the shop a few doors down was all shot up - the window was peppered with what look to me like bullet holes. The neighborhood is, by all means, safe. But I must have missed something big last night. Or maybe it's been like that for a while and I just hadn't noticed.
At the moment I am sitting back at Le Cactus. It is way out of my way, but I like the guys here and like to visit. Today seems to be not a good day for visiting... or maybe it is just because I am clamming up feeling shy today. Damned shy gene!
a la procheine (not sure i spelled that right...) mes amies!
All moved into the new pad and so happy. It of course has it's short comings but they are all part of the character. =) I'll post the pictures soon. I took some this morning but forgot to load them onto my computer before leaving the house. I don't have internet at home yet - so these may be a little slow in coming.
I will note, though, that as my studio faces the courtyard in the center of the building I am oblivious to what happens over night on the street. This morning I left the apt to find that the shop a few doors down was all shot up - the window was peppered with what look to me like bullet holes. The neighborhood is, by all means, safe. But I must have missed something big last night. Or maybe it's been like that for a while and I just hadn't noticed.
At the moment I am sitting back at Le Cactus. It is way out of my way, but I like the guys here and like to visit. Today seems to be not a good day for visiting... or maybe it is just because I am clamming up feeling shy today. Damned shy gene!
a la procheine (not sure i spelled that right...) mes amies!
Saturday, February 14, 2009
Looking up & the hippy-jiggy-boogy (it's a long one...)
DATELINE: 14.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
I'm free! I'M FREE!!! Yes freeeeeeeedom has beeeeeeeecome a reality!!
I'm done with the crazy lady. I moved out this morning. The departure was ugly. She is a nasty nasty lady. I'm so glad to not be living there anymore. I'm trying to tap into my yoga peace loving self and resist the urge to do something vindictive and nasty to her.
I had thought telling her I was moving out had gone fairly well and would be fairly amicable. But then suddenly she got nasty nasty nasty. She decided I'd lied to her about money (to be fair, as I may have said before, I had avoided paying her the rent when I first moved in because she wasn't delivering on the things she had said were part of the rent... ie: a bed, and internet). Then she somehow decided that I was going to steal her house while she wasn't looking.
I woke up on Friday morning to find a note asking me to leave on Saturday morning (today) - while I had paid her for two weeks and she had already agreed to my leaving on Sunday late afternoon. I can't move into the new place until tomorrow afternoon, otherwise I gladly would have left sooner. I was out last night at a concert (more about that in a moment) and didn't get back to the apt until 10:30 this morning.
I arrived to find all of my food taken out of the refrigerator and put in a trash bag in the hall. Nasty nasty witchy lady. I packed up all my belongings. She stood by the door as I headed out and when she requested the key, I requested the two days of rent back - since she was kicking me out two days early. She started shouting that I had lied to her about money, that she had paid for the internet, and that in the states you pay on the first day of the month. I retorted that we are not in the states and that she had lied about what was included in the rent. I threw the keys into the apt and stormed out (yeah, it was not one of my most shining moments, but I was angry). I wish i'd left an egg to rot under the bed. Maybe I'll pull that old college trick of filling the ziplock baggy with some stinky substance and exploding it under the door. ha.
Maybe I'll just indulge in the fantasy of it, because I believe in karma and don't want karma to bite me in the arse. As Gary said: karma and fate are two sisters you don't mess with, because they will cut you!
But I am so relieved to be done with her and so excited to move into my new pad. I've been told that my new landlord actually _thanked_ the friend who referred me to her for referring me. Can you believe the difference? Amazing. Anne, my friend who lives two floors below my new home, has already been amazingly hospitable. And her teenage daughter so kind, and seems also fairly enthusiastic about me moving in upstairs. It'll be a bit like having a little sister. =) I can dig it.
Things are really looking up.
So let's talk about the hippy-jiggy-boogy. You know the hippy-jiggy-boogy. It's what happens when there is a band jamming out with some funky good grooves and you just can't help but get up out of your seat and shake your butt and then next thing you know your arms are going and your feet are going and you have to smile. You have to because your whole body is smiling and you are just happy and loving every minute of it. And who cares what you look like because at first maybe you are the only one brave enough to get up and get your groove on but you quickly notice that all the sudden there are tons of people around you doing the same thing. You know they were just itching to do it but needed someone to give them permission. You are having a great time, the music is great, you're shakin' yo' thang, and loving that you could be the person to give them the permission to break out and shake it! That's the hippy-jiggy-boogy. But I don't know how to say that in French...
Last night I went to a concert with Dené & Jacob in one of the burbs of Paris, an area called Cretiel. The venue is called the Maison des Arts. The venue was really cool, really attractive with a large stone plaza in front (kind of like the Met in NYC has - but larger). The area around the venue, really awful. It's concrete everywhere. It feels like an industrial wasteland - that is, what we saw between the metro and the venue. The entire distance between the two can be traversed without ever touching ground. You pass through the second level of a large shopping mall. It leaves you feeling rather gross.
The concert was Saul Williams, opening band was Anthony Joseph & the Spasm Band (from Trinidad). It was a great show. I was kicking myself much of the time because I had left my camera at home, assuming that like concerts in the States we would be frisked before going in and without a bag to stash my camera in (didn't want to bring my bag) they wouldn't let me in or it would get confiscated - something like that. That may have been a slightly irrational assumption, but in any case I thought it best to simply not bring it.
I also didn't imagine that I would get close enough to take any worth while pics. Well... as it turned out they don't frisk you or even seem to check bags, and I spent the whole show shakin' my butt right at the edge of the stage, front and center! I could have kissed Saul Williams' feet, many many times over. I could have pulled his pants down if I were taller. I could have groped his crotch if I actually felt like getting kicked in the head. The spot where we were was unbelievable. I haven't had a spot that good since I shot for PFC in Denver. Everyone on either side of me was shooting and filming, and by that point security had utterly abandoned any hope of stopping them so wasn't even bothering them. Sigh...
It was a fantastic show and was *just* what the doctor ordered. Thanks, Dené, for putting the idea in my head and inviting me!!
I'm free! I'M FREE!!! Yes freeeeeeeedom has beeeeeeeecome a reality!!
I'm done with the crazy lady. I moved out this morning. The departure was ugly. She is a nasty nasty lady. I'm so glad to not be living there anymore. I'm trying to tap into my yoga peace loving self and resist the urge to do something vindictive and nasty to her.
I had thought telling her I was moving out had gone fairly well and would be fairly amicable. But then suddenly she got nasty nasty nasty. She decided I'd lied to her about money (to be fair, as I may have said before, I had avoided paying her the rent when I first moved in because she wasn't delivering on the things she had said were part of the rent... ie: a bed, and internet). Then she somehow decided that I was going to steal her house while she wasn't looking.
I woke up on Friday morning to find a note asking me to leave on Saturday morning (today) - while I had paid her for two weeks and she had already agreed to my leaving on Sunday late afternoon. I can't move into the new place until tomorrow afternoon, otherwise I gladly would have left sooner. I was out last night at a concert (more about that in a moment) and didn't get back to the apt until 10:30 this morning.
I arrived to find all of my food taken out of the refrigerator and put in a trash bag in the hall. Nasty nasty witchy lady. I packed up all my belongings. She stood by the door as I headed out and when she requested the key, I requested the two days of rent back - since she was kicking me out two days early. She started shouting that I had lied to her about money, that she had paid for the internet, and that in the states you pay on the first day of the month. I retorted that we are not in the states and that she had lied about what was included in the rent. I threw the keys into the apt and stormed out (yeah, it was not one of my most shining moments, but I was angry). I wish i'd left an egg to rot under the bed. Maybe I'll pull that old college trick of filling the ziplock baggy with some stinky substance and exploding it under the door. ha.
Maybe I'll just indulge in the fantasy of it, because I believe in karma and don't want karma to bite me in the arse. As Gary said: karma and fate are two sisters you don't mess with, because they will cut you!
But I am so relieved to be done with her and so excited to move into my new pad. I've been told that my new landlord actually _thanked_ the friend who referred me to her for referring me. Can you believe the difference? Amazing. Anne, my friend who lives two floors below my new home, has already been amazingly hospitable. And her teenage daughter so kind, and seems also fairly enthusiastic about me moving in upstairs. It'll be a bit like having a little sister. =) I can dig it.
Things are really looking up.
So let's talk about the hippy-jiggy-boogy. You know the hippy-jiggy-boogy. It's what happens when there is a band jamming out with some funky good grooves and you just can't help but get up out of your seat and shake your butt and then next thing you know your arms are going and your feet are going and you have to smile. You have to because your whole body is smiling and you are just happy and loving every minute of it. And who cares what you look like because at first maybe you are the only one brave enough to get up and get your groove on but you quickly notice that all the sudden there are tons of people around you doing the same thing. You know they were just itching to do it but needed someone to give them permission. You are having a great time, the music is great, you're shakin' yo' thang, and loving that you could be the person to give them the permission to break out and shake it! That's the hippy-jiggy-boogy. But I don't know how to say that in French...
Last night I went to a concert with Dené & Jacob in one of the burbs of Paris, an area called Cretiel. The venue is called the Maison des Arts. The venue was really cool, really attractive with a large stone plaza in front (kind of like the Met in NYC has - but larger). The area around the venue, really awful. It's concrete everywhere. It feels like an industrial wasteland - that is, what we saw between the metro and the venue. The entire distance between the two can be traversed without ever touching ground. You pass through the second level of a large shopping mall. It leaves you feeling rather gross.
The concert was Saul Williams, opening band was Anthony Joseph & the Spasm Band (from Trinidad). It was a great show. I was kicking myself much of the time because I had left my camera at home, assuming that like concerts in the States we would be frisked before going in and without a bag to stash my camera in (didn't want to bring my bag) they wouldn't let me in or it would get confiscated - something like that. That may have been a slightly irrational assumption, but in any case I thought it best to simply not bring it.
I also didn't imagine that I would get close enough to take any worth while pics. Well... as it turned out they don't frisk you or even seem to check bags, and I spent the whole show shakin' my butt right at the edge of the stage, front and center! I could have kissed Saul Williams' feet, many many times over. I could have pulled his pants down if I were taller. I could have groped his crotch if I actually felt like getting kicked in the head. The spot where we were was unbelievable. I haven't had a spot that good since I shot for PFC in Denver. Everyone on either side of me was shooting and filming, and by that point security had utterly abandoned any hope of stopping them so wasn't even bothering them. Sigh...
It was a fantastic show and was *just* what the doctor ordered. Thanks, Dené, for putting the idea in my head and inviting me!!
Thursday, February 12, 2009
What are people really looking for... ?
DATELINE: 12.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
Behind Single wall mounting shelves
you un-Folded, all dressed in G-reen
we sat on a Cafe table
with your Hair dryer
Dying to see your crack...
for ...-----------------------NNNON NO NON NO - STOP
STOP!
it wasnt meant to sound like that AT ALL
sorry...let me try once more :
Behind the wall mounted shelves
you un-Folded
dressed in G-reen
I'd met you in a Cafe
sat round the same table
with your Hair dryed in Black
I had to feel a ...?
You showed me the way under the Duvet
in your Single size futon mattress
but I had flatulence
and was feeling kinda stress-ed
CHORUS E A A E Em
why don't we fly with my
house-plants-Espresso-machine or stovetop-espresso-maker
on folding chairs ...Beneath the waves...of Menilmuche...
oh Christ...
it's appalling...five minutes ago I just wrote this ONE big future hit...now I can't seem to renew the effort...
HELP ME...
folding-chairs should rhyme with stairs of hairs...uuuh!
God Bless America!
OK, so this morning I went onto the Paris Craigslist in hopes of finding some items that I feel the studio I am moving into could really use. Rather, that I could really use while in the apt. Of course, being there for only a matter of months, I don't want to buy things if I don't have to. To the Items Wanted section I posted a request, and a list of the items I am looking for (things like a hair dryer, a folding room screen, folding chairs..). This evening, I received the following response, and really just have to share it.
Enjoy.
----------
Behind Single wall mounting shelves
you un-Folded, all dressed in G-reen
we sat on a Cafe table
with your Hair dryer
Dying to see your crack...
for ...-----------------------NNNON NO NON NO - STOP
STOP!
it wasnt meant to sound like that AT ALL
sorry...let me try once more :
Behind the wall mounted shelves
you un-Folded
dressed in G-reen
I'd met you in a Cafe
sat round the same table
with your Hair dryed in Black
I had to feel a ...?
You showed me the way under the Duvet
in your Single size futon mattress
but I had flatulence
and was feeling kinda stress-ed
CHORUS E A A E Em
why don't we fly with my
house-plants-Espresso-machine or stovetop-espresso-maker
on folding chairs ...Beneath the waves...of Menilmuche...
oh Christ...
it's appalling...five minutes ago I just wrote this ONE big future hit...now I can't seem to renew the effort...
HELP ME...
folding-chairs should rhyme with stairs of hairs...uuuh!
God Bless America!
J'habite a Paris, en France
DATELINE: 12.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
Slowly, very slowly, high school french is coming back to me - with the help of Rosetta Stone. I'm far from conversational but I am working on it.
So the big news is that I am moving again!! This sunday. I'm actually quite excited. I am moving into a *small* studio apartment, on the 6th floor (that is up 7 flights), sans ascensor. My legs are going to be super-fly after 5 months of those stairs! I'll also have to learn to not forget things when I leave the house.
The apartment is small, but is really "just enough". Small kitchen (sadly, no oven), small bath (with the toilet inside the apt!!) and shower with a small bathtub. Small bed. BIG window overlooking the courtyard and another in the kitchen opening skyward. The bed is still essentially child sized but is actually appropriate for this space and at this price, it's acceptable. The space is so cute... It's really so terribly French it's a bit amazing.
The neighborhood is great - really active, full of people, and great stuff. Good cafes, little markets all over the place, grocery store on the corner a block down, and only a 15 minute walk from the royal Opera house. As I was exploring the neighborhood two things caught my eye and I took them to be good omens about my new apt (and it turned out, rightly so!): about 5 doors down is the largest pro photo supply shop in Paris. It's huge (for a Parisian store)! A few stops before that, I think it was maybe one block further away from my building, is a buddhist meditation center. Ahhhhhh... home.
To top it off, my new landlady is a profession photographer who has been shooting solely for the French professional theater for the last 30 years. Seriously? The fates did not have to hit me over the head - clearly, this is the place I am supposed to be! She owns the apartment on the floor below the studio I will be renting, but uses it only as her office so is never there at night - so if I feel like I want to dance a jig in my undies at midnight, not a problem! ;) I'll be able to use her washing machine during the day if I need to (thank god... can you imagine hauling laundry up and down 7 flights of stairs??), and maybe I'll be able to use her oven to bake in sometimes. If not, on the floor below her is my friend Anne and her daughter Rosa. I'm looking forward to joining then for episodes of Lost on DVD, along with other such indulgences. I am going to bribe them with fresh cookies so that I can use the oven sometimes... =)
I've been trying to draw more since I got here. Been shooting some too, mostly with my Lumix p&s cam, but have been inspired to try to do more drawing. I'm convinced that it will make my photos better. Drawing, specifically drawing people, has always been really challenging for me. I'm always trying to make my drawings look like what I see and to be really detailed and lively - like the work of my friends and older brother who are much better than I am. I get caught up in that - trying to make it perfect. So I've forced myself to draw what there is no time to perfect - people on the subway or in cafes. Drawing them without them noticing is a challenge to be sure. It generally means I have only a few minutes to work in, and I can't stare at them to try to get things just right. Somehow this combination seems to be serving me well. I'm happy with a few of the drawings I did yesterday. Happy with a sketch I did of the broken remains of a statue in St. Germain de Pres. It's a good feeling. I admittedly am also getting a kick out of what a spectacle I become for people who notice I am drawing. Through it, I've also noticed that big hats are still very popular among a certain age group of Parisian women. =)
Speaking of - tonight I saw a hair coat. Not a fur coat. No. Literally, a hair coat. I think this woman skinned a yak to make this coat. She was very proud, fluttering around on tiny little shoes and wearing the most obscene coat... she looked like a caricature. Amazing.
I leave you to picture me rockin' out in my undies in a tiny studio apt at the very top of an old french building, and to picture a women in her tiny shoes and enormous shaggy coat of yak hair....
Son manteau de cheveux.
a tout la monde de Paris... A plus!
Monday, February 9, 2009
oh wait...
(a thought to add to 10.02.09)
Oh wait a minute... it just occured to me...
who gives a crap about this stupid biz with my housing drama! I'M IN F*IN PARIS!!
HOLY SHITE! I LIVE IN PARIS!!
really?? really? I mean that?
Holy crap! I DO mean that!!
That's freakin' amazing!
hahaha... WOO HOO....hahaha...
FUCK YEAH! I LIVE IN PARIS!!
=D
That was not a sausage...
DATELINE: 10.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
I honestly think I might hurl. I bought something tonight to eat for dinner that I thought was a beef sausage. I started cooking it and actually it smelled horrid, like spicy melting plastic, and nothing like a sausage. It also quickly stopped looking like a sausage and started looking like a severed penis. Sorry, boys. Hope that doesn't give you nightmares. But honestly it was really unappealing. In the interest of trying new things, I was determined to give it a chance. The woman I am currently living with (renting from) told me that it is a kind of sausage that "people from the arabic countries eat". That it has chili in it. OK, I thought, that can't be all that bad. But honestly, OMG. I managed to consume one of the two I had opted to eat with my brussel sprouts for dinner. I couldn't even force myself to eat the second. And the other 4 are all going in the trash also. Chalk that €3 loss up to experience. And pray to the almighty baguette that the one I did eat does not get returned to sender.
So .... Saturday I went to try to take advantage of "the soldes". It was a miserable day - snowing bit fat flakes, raining, windy... fun! So we went to this underground shopping mall known as Les Halles. Big box stores type stuff. I snagged a few t-shirts but was so otherwise overwhelmed by the hordes of people that I could not make decisions. It was a zoo. So, it was an experience, fun hanging out with "the americans" (Dene & Jacob) but otherwise pretty fruitless.
Sunday Dene, Jacob, and I went to see the Yann Arthur-Bertrand exhibit at the Grand Palais. I learned that those gilded pillars in one of my photos in Photo Edition 3 is part of the structures of the Grand Palais. Aha! Exciting to connect the dots. The exhibit was amazing. A really remarkable project. Video portraits of 6 million people (hence the name "6 Million Others") from all over the globe. They were all asked the same 18 questions, and then video mantages were created with their answers - grouped by theme. If this exhibit comes your way, I strongly urge you to go see it. I was there for 4 hrs (then they kicked me out because the museum was closing), but easily could have stayed another 4 hrs.
Today was just a ton of reading. Lots and lots of reading. And a lot of snow. There is a "tempet" (I think I have that spelled wrong) hitting france now. This is the second major storm to hit since I arrived. The last one left the southern part of france without electricity for nearly a week. This one has grounded all flights until at least tomorrow afternoon. It is dumping tons of rain on Paris. Fun.
On the housing front - I am going to see the studio apt tomorrow. I will hopefully be moving into it at the end of the week. If that for some odd reason doesn't work out, I have another option that would begin at the end of the month. Though I actually have competition for that one. Telling the woman I am renting from that I am leaving is not going to be easy. She had been very very lax about when and how she wants the rent payment from me, up until now. Now she has decided it must all come right away and that she told me at the beginning that the security deposit is needed now also (actually, she never specified, in my defense). In any case, she is pressing me and I am going to have to tell her tomorrow night/Wednesday morning (depending on what time I get home tomorrow) that I'm not staying. The next week of my life is going to be really really unpleasant, I am sure.
Wish me luck. And let's hope that this be one of the very last installments of the blog that is eaten up by complaining about housing. Although I hear that it is very french to complain a lot. I thought that was an American thing... ;)
a tout le monde de Paris, a plus!
Saturday, February 7, 2009
Photo edition 3
It's not a very good shot, but that night pic there is of *one side* of the two lines that were waiting to get into the Grand Palais museum to see the Picasso exhibit. This is the shorter half, where the people pre-reserved their tickets. This line is only 2-3 hrs long. the one not depicted is the one we were momentarily standing in that was 4hrs long. It's roughtly 10:15 or later at this point in the night.
February 2nd, it snowed for the second time all winter. 
Fun with photos in the train station. Waiting for the train RER that I occasionally ride to school.
Me infront of the front entrance to the Hotel des Invalides. The previous shot was apartently the back property... or side. Something like that. This seems to be where most people enter from.
I don't actually know what this is. It's across the street from Invalides. It's at a bridge that crosses the Seine. Beyond that... no idea. have to look that up one of these days.friday, the soldes are nearly over
DATELINE: 06.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
A very long day. Class this morning was an overwhelming flood of information about the purpose of, the process of, and the limitations and advantages of scientific experiments (specifically in psychology) and the DSM. I thought my brain was going to burst. I really did. My brain is still working on digesting last night's episode of Psychoanalysis & The Fairy tale, where we spent three hours discussing Freud's analysis of the neurotic behavior of a 5-yr old (a 112pg case study) and his theories on children's sexual mythologies (where do babies come from?), and the oedipal complex.
Ouch. My brain hurts.
But it's the good kind of hurt, like the way the body hurts after swimming the length of Walden Pond for the first time of the season after a winter of sitting on your arse.
Today was a buys busy day. Went from class to lunch with Marylee & John, to tea with Sylvie who leaves in the morning to return to NYC ( :-( ), and then on to visit with Anne - where I checked out the building and neighborhood where the studio apartment I might be moving into is. But I didn't get to see the apartment itself because the landlord isn't able to show it until tuesday.
I think that likely I will make this move. It's so much cheaper and I do think that having a place to myself is what I need right now. Cheaper than what I am currently paying is definitely what I need. At least then I can afford to buy myself something to make the bed softer if it is like sleeping on a stone slab. This new place is also a much shorter commute school. It's not going to be as posh, and 7 flights of stairs up and down will be a work out, but it might be just right.
I feel a little like the Goldylocks. This apartment is too shitty. This apartment is too posh/expensive. And maybe, just maybe, this porridge will be _just right_.
Speaking of _just right_, I'm headed tomorrow to take advantage of the final day of the "soldes". In France all of the stores are only allowed to have sales twice/yr, and all at the same time. So there are 2-3 wks of "Soldes" (sales) in Jan/Feb and then again in July. It's illegal for them to have them any other time. So tomorrow we shop! It's bound to be insanity because it's the final day (why do i wait until the end??) and it's a saturday. But hopefully I can find what I am looking for. Ah, a common thread on many fronts.
On that note, to bed with me...
a tout le monde de Paris, a plus tard mes amies!
Thursday, February 5, 2009
Photo edition 2
DATELINE: 05.02.09 PARIS, FRANCEThis (below and to the left) is the super cute square that Aimee lives on (literally, right on - in fact, her building is in this picture). And that is a terrible photo of me in front of the square.
This is the loft where i spent my first several nights on the couch. It really is a beautiful place in a great location.
Above is a night shot of the view out the bedroom window of the room I stayed in with John & Marylee
"..Not gonna shake me, I'm gonna shift my step." - Strangefolk
DATELINE: 05.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
Sorry for the missed entry yesterday kids. Not being able to get my computer online at home is a real pain in my arse. Finally this afternoon we were able to get my computer online but now I find that the signal in my room is not strong enough for my computer to pick it up. Serious pain in the ass.
So, clearly, I will be moving on. I have an offer on a studio apartment, all to myself, in a great neighborhood, a much easier/shorter commute to school, for €150 *less* than what I am presently spending to sleep on a child-size single bed, in a room without a desk, that doesn't get internet signal - where the woman I am renting from wants me to pay the charge that the provider is billing for helping get my computer on line (even though the answer to the problem was exactly as I had told her - they were telling us to connect to the connection that was not ours, so of course the password didn't work). No thank you.
In the building where the studio apartment I will move into is I will also have a friend, Anne. Anne is a woman in her late 50s or so who I met through John & Marylee, the lovely older American couple with whom I lived for the previous week. So though living alone, I will be far from isolated, and I will not have to worry about stepping on eggshells if I want to have a friend over, have a guest stay, or feel like walking around in my underpants all day. I don't have to worry about inpinging on anyone else's lifestyle or space. My space will simply be my own. Wow, that is a good feeling. At 30, I feel like it's about time!
So, I think I shall recap for you the last week. Ready?
ok: Sunday I moved into the apt on Ave. de Saint-Mandé. Dropped my stuff off (which was a million times easier to because Amelie picked me up from my previous residence and drove me to the new one, and helped me haul my stuff - my god, what a sweet girl!), and then Amelie and I ran back out to meet up with her beau and his friend to try to catch the last hours of the Picasso exhibit that everyone has been crazy for. We thought that we had outsmarted the crowds by going at 10pm on a Sunday night. For the last week of the show they had the museum open around the clock (honest) because the crowds were so nuts. Why we thought this night would be any different than all other nights, I don't know. To make all matters so much worse, this sunday was the one day of the month that the museums are free. So the 4 of us arrive, feeling quite proud of ourselves and very excited for the show. What we find upon our arrival is absolutely insane. There are two very dense lines encircling the lawn in front of the museum, leading up the steps to the entrance, and guards like riot police managing the scene. The ropes guiding the two lines (1 for tickets at the door and the other for those who'd pre-reserved them) have markers on them. The markers denote how long you should expect to be waiting inline from that point in the line. the point the line was at when we arrived... 4 HOUR wait. 4 HOURS. That means that everyone in the line up until that point had said, well, it's freezing and it's going to be 1:30 in the morning before I enter the museum, but sure, ok, I'm game. We, on the other hand, decided that 4 hours in line and not getting into the museum until after 2am was not happening. We bailed and went for a drink. Which, by the way was a lot of fun. I am feeling a lot like I am FES from That 70s Show.
Most of the rest of the week was just class and the battle over getting my computer onto the WiFi connection. Tuesday I visited Le Cactus cafe to get online and had a lot of fun chatting with my friends there (by my friends I mean the two guys who work there and are there every time I go - they are really sweet and I'm glad for any excuse to visit them), went to Sylvie's for Tea, and then went to Aimee's for dinner. I'm so spoiled here...
Last night - Wednesday, I was pretty much home, but met Sylvie over at Saint Germain de Pres, an old and historic church. It's really beautiful, and huge, and houses L'Ecole de Beaux Artes (if I understood correctly... which, all things considered, I likely did not). I did a little sketch of a broken statue of Mary holding the baby Jesus. It came out fairly well - and a lot of other visitors seemed to find me and my sketching an interesting part of the scenery. I bought my first crepe since my arrival in Paris that day. I decided that it was absolutely shameful that I hadn't had one yet, and went and had one. Sylvie arrived and we shared it, then went for a hazelnut one. Man, if I were without budget constraints I would quickly get fat on crepes.
More photos are coming in a separate post.
time to get back to my school work.
a tout la monde de Paris, a plus!!
Tuesday, February 3, 2009
photo edition: Janvier
DATELINE: 03.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE(i can't get blogger to let me arrange the photos or where the text goes in relationship to them, so please pardon the discombobulated look)
The requisite Eiffel Tower shots. Dusk. A little blurry.. sorry. Just as a point of reference: this is two blocks from where my classes are. Pretty sweet, eh? ;)
At the Sunday market at Place Monge with Sylvie. There is the knife/scissor sharpener ... why have such services disappeared from most places in the states? He's so handy!
Some night shots from the bridge across the Seine, on my walk between Sylvie's house and Arthur's loft.
There are ads all over Paris for Orangina that are variations on this one. Amazing.
Walking from Gare d'Austerlitz back toward Sylvie's. I was having a really crappy day, and it was cold and grey, as it had been for days. But I loved this willow tree. And the walk along the river was great (and very long).
Some cool iron work on the side of a building, and the attractive, very typical architecture next to it.
(above) The Hotel d'Invalides, courtyard. Me walking through the gardens in between Invalides and the river on my way towards the American University, and a front view of Invalides.
Below that are photos of Sylvie's book signing at a little bookstore near where I was staying in La Marais.
Sunday, February 1, 2009
I HAVE A HOME!
DATELINE: 01.02.09 PARIS, FRANCE
I cannot tell you how excited I am to not be apartment hunting any more. Later this evening I will be moving into an apartment with a young mother and her two young daughters (who are, by the way, completely adorable), age 7 & 9. Granted in a perfect world I would have found a studio apartment that I could afford, but I did not want to live in a crummy apartment with a toilet that frightened me. So a room in a nice apartment with a nice young family is good by me!
As of yesterday afternoon, I didn't think this option was going to come through, and had been frantically hunting for alternatives. I had seen two apartments yesterday that I thought i could manage to live in, and was feeling much encouraged after the horrific apartments I had seen before then. Neither of these two options had the Scary Toilet Monster, and both were in great locations. the first was a studio apartment - a HUGE studio apartment very close to the National Opera house and the area called the Palais Royale. It was lovely but way out of my pricerange. The woman showing it thought she could talk the owner down (seeing as it was her son-in-law), but their requirement was that the tenant be flexible. We talked about my living there for maybe one month, after which point the landlord hoped to come and do some work on the apt. I thought this was a great option, but it was not certain that the landlord would go for it, at nearly €400 less than he was asking. And Sylvie made a good point: did I really want to start this whole apt hunting process all over again in just 4 short weeks?
The other apartment was in a pretty amazing location, but the woman I would be living with was a royal pain in the ass. She wanted 22 guarantees of my existence and everything handled in cash. At the point when I didn't see any alternative, I was willing to put up with that.
I am much relieved to be moving in to this apartment near the metro station "Picpus", in the 12th arrondissement.
In other news (boy am I glad I can stop talking about searching for apartments), last night I went salsa dancing with Naomi and Juan Carlos. I had a blast. Salsa dancing is apparently really popular here, and it is something that the cool kids do (yes, the cool kids of *all* backgrounds). I found that really interesting because my adventures in salsa dancing in Boston had shown me that the women of my age group enjoy it but that the men who attend are 40+ and rather slimy (both literally and figuratively). Those who don't fit that description are barely 21 and the stereotype of undergraduates from the math department at MIT (read: not typically described as "the cool kids"). Most of the people at the salsa club we went to last night were, I would say, in their 20s to late 30s. And the vast majority were *really* good. They teach a slightly different basic step than what we learned in Boston, and the lesson at the beginning of the night runs for 2hrs! At some point I ducked out of the lesson and watched from the side because I was utterly confused: learning the dance is extra hard when you can't hear what is being said and you don't understand what you can hear. Nor can you understand what your partner is saying to you. Luckily, later on there were a number of very kind and very patient partners willing to put up with me tripping over my own two feel, staring at the ground, not understanding where they wanted me to go (wait, what? oh, whoops... you wanted me to turn and then step over there... where are we going now?), and running into just about every other dancer on the dance floor. There were many many really good dancers there and it was also really a lot of fun to watch. When we left at 2am, it was still going fairly strong. Maybe next time we'll stay later. But next time I won't fall for the most expensive bottle of water trick ever again (cost me more than a cocktail). Next time I'll find the water fountain.
And now, it's time to re-pack my bags and prepare to move!!
a tout le monde de Paris, France: a plus!
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